Voices of the Spaghetti Western ~ “Fall of the Mohicans”

 As we know most of the Euro-westerns were co-productions from Italy, Spain, Germany and France which incorporated British and American actors to gain a worldwide audience. The films were shot silent and then dubbed into the various languages where they were sold for distribution. That means Italian, Spanish, German, French and English voice actors were hired to dub the films. Even actors from the countries where the film was to be shown were often dubbed by voice actors for various reasons such as the actors were already busy making another film, they wanted to be paid additional salaries for dubbing their voices, the actor’s voice didn’t fit the character they were playing, accidents to the actors and in some cases even death before the film could be dubbed.

I’ll list a Euro-western and the (I) Italian, (S) Spanish, (G) German and (F) French, (E) English voices that I can find and once in a while a bio on a specific voice actor as in Europe these actors are as well-known as the actors they voiced.

Today we’ll cover “Fall of the Mohicans”

[(I) Italian, (S) Spanish, (G) German, (F) French, (E) English]

Major Duncan Hayward – Jack Taylor (S) Simón Ramírez, (G) Helmo Kindermann

Colonel Munro – Paul Muller (S), José Guardiola (G) Wolf Ackva

Cora Munro – Sara Lezana (S) Mari Ángeles Herranz, (G) ?

Uncas – Daniel Martin (S) Daniel Martin, (G) Michael Cramer

Cunning Fox - José Manuel Martín (S) Joaquín Vidriales, (G) Herbert Weicker

Hawkeye – Luis Induni (S) Vicente Bañó, (G) Hans-Dieter Zeidler

Alice Munro – Barbara Loy (S) Ana María Saizar, (G) ?

Wolf Ackva  (1911 – 2000)

Wolf Ackva was born on July 30, 1911, in Montigny-lès-Metz, France. He was a German voice actor known for his patriarchal, authoritative voice, put to use dubbing Sam the Eagle on ‘The Muppet Show’ and in related productions, through the German dub of ‘Muppets Tonight’.

Ackva began his career as a writer and subsequently studied medicine before entering the acting profession. He became active in German film and television from 1937 onward. He played Sherlock Holmes in a 1955 TV version of ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’ and was a regular on the crime series ‘Die seltsamen Methoden des Franz Josef Wanninger’ (as Kriminaloberinspektor Steiner). In the 1970s French co-production of ‘The Count of Monte Cristo’, he played prison official turned philanthropist Boville.

As a voice actor, Ackva was heard in the James Bond franchise, dubbing actors Bernard Lee and Robert Brown as M in a total of seven films, and Geoffrey Keen in “For Your Eyes Only”. He also dubbed Gregory Peck in three films, Henry Fonda in “Mister Roberts”, Vincent Price in “Theater of Blood”, James Mason in “Duffy”, Edward Asner in “The Doomsday Flight”, and Richard Attenborough in the Kenneth Branagh “Hamlet”, in addition to narrating several films. His animation credits include Theoden in Ralph Bakshi's 1978 animated version of “The Lord of the Rings” and several aliens on the animated ‘Star Trek’.

Ackva was married to actress Els Ackva [1930- ] from 1960 until his death on January 16, 2000, in Fahrenzhausen, Bavaria, Germany at the age of 89.